Pros
- Almost unlimited resources for your research - Very smart colleagues - Productive Environment - Great fun to do great work - Great cafeterias - Decent gym and swimming pool
Cons
- Post-docs have to pay for the gym (used to be for free, and is for free for students and other faculty) - Post-docs are low priority, relatively, for HR. I found that they were not very motivated to help with issues regarding housing and other benefits, insisting on arbitrary rules, even under exceptional circumstances. - The administration is a bit slow in responding to complains about (sexually, verbally, socially) abusive famous faculty. I think there is room for improvement, and it is underway. - Caltech puts a relatively low cap on salaries for post-docs, so that the salaries are lower than they are at many other, similar institutions, despite the high cost of living in Pasadena.